Alternate Ending to MR 3
by Deadly-Bagel
Summary: I hated the ending of MR 3. There was so little emphasis on things like Ari dying, and they didn't even do anything. I rewrote the exciting bits, just substitute and ignore the disjointed transition back to the book.
1. Chapter 1

Flock Reunion, Ch 1

Fang sat in a dark hanger at the Washington DC airport, his laptop casting an eerie glow around him. It was 8 pm, and Fang had offered to take the whole watch. Iggy and Gazzy were beat, but Fang was a little better. They had flown across the whole US, stopping only for quick meals and breaks. Iggy and Gazzy had collapsed on the floor an hour ago, but Fang could not afford sleep. There was a plane leaving at 5 am, and he intended on being on it.

He sighed, closed the lid on the laptop and stashed it in his bag. More and more people were reading the blog, organising protests, rebelling against Itex. He really thought that it could save the world. Max was in way above her head. She was only fourteen, and shouldn't have to worry about keeping herself and five other kids alive _and_ save the world.

He felt more comfortable without the pool of light cast by the screen, but it still felt weird without Max's even breathing reassuring him that the Flock was okay. But if she was still with that cretin, Fang swore he would kill Max after he rescued her.

A faint noise made Fang jolt upright, listening intently. There it was again. He leaned over and gently tapped Gazzy's and Iggy's legs. They woke instantly and on alert, years of paranoia kicking in. Fang put a finger over his lips, and tapped Iggy's hand twice. They nodded.

That's when the hanger _imploded_. The doors blew inward, the high windows shattered, showering glass everywhere. Hundreds of Flyboys streamed in, weapons armed and pointed at the three bird kids.

'Oh crap' Iggy and Fang said at the same time. They launched themselves into the air, wings snapping out and brushing the floor on the first downstroke.

'You will come with us' every single Flyboy intoned, as if there was only one voice.

"Try me!' yelled Fang as he launched himself at the nearest one, kicking it hard in the shoulder, which popped out. He grabbed it by the neck and swung the whole Flyboy around, with much difficulty seeing as it weighed probably three times more than him, into two more. Iggy and Gazzy were holding their own, blocking and dodging flurries of punches and landing a few of their own.

'Come with us and you might see the rest of your Flock alive' droned a Flyboy, as Fang disposed of another one.

That made Fang pause, and he was rewarded with a kick to his kidney, his breath leaving with an _oomph_. In seconds, Flyboys were all over him, tying his hands and feet together. But he wasn't giving up that easy. He folded his wings, dropping from their grip, the plastic cords falling off as Flyboys clumsily flew into each other while they tried to follow him. He snapped his wings back out, but not in time so that he hit the ground, _hard_. Groaning, he spotted a gun just next to him.

'You will come with us' droned the Flyboys, but Fang just answered with a burst of automatic gunfire.

Fang suddenly questioned Max's 'no gun rule', as maybe fifteen Flyboys hit the ground. He spun and took out another twenty before the gun was dry. Picked up another one he took to the air, mowing down wave after wave of hideous robots.

'We will take you to your Flock, where you will be exterminated together'

'Or, I could just _kill you all' _Fang retorted, accompanied with a wave of bullets.

'After we capture you, we will take you apart, then post the images on your blog to show the world what happens to heroes. Then you will be tortured and made to take back everything you said'

'Yeah, right, torture me _after_ you kill me!'

'You will come with us'

'OK, bored now' Fang said as he quickly mowed down some more. A Flyboy landed on his back, crushing one wing. He sucked in a breath and dropped like a rock, landing on the Flyboy.

Gazzy and Iggy were already tied up, Flyboys dragging them out the destroyed hanger doors. Fang ran to get to them, but more Flyboys jumped in his way. He managed to take down two or three before they snatched the gun out of his hand and whacked him in the head with it, knocking him out cold.


	2. Chapter 2

'Max?' Angel's voice was quiet, solemn. She still hadn't fully recovered from when she had been in the School, and now she was chained to a dungeon wall by her ankle.

I was going to kill that woman. _(Thanks to MaxRideNut for pointing out the continuity error)_

Every now and then, an eraser-replacement would come and throw some bread on the floor, which was quickly consumed, but it didn't exactly hit three thousand calories.

'Yes, sweetie?' I struggled to say without my voice breaking or sounding scared or defeated.

'When's Fang gonna get here?'

I had been wondering the same thing. We had sent the message maybe 24 hours ago, but it would take him maybe that long to get to an airport, then the plane trip on top of that. Assuming he got my message. Assuming he had gotten over Ari. Assuming he didn't hate me now.

God I was depressed.

'I don't know.' I said, and her eyes fell. 'Tomorrow we're gonna kick some whitecoat butt to get some descent food.' I said with purpose. Always pretend there was a plan.

Angel looked unconvinced, but closed her eyes and soon I was listening to only calm, regular breathing. That and the loudspeaker blaring at us in foreign languages, but I tuned out and shut my eyes. I wasn't going to sleep a wink.

* * *

I jolted awake the next morning –at least, I assume it was morning– and immediately registered a robot holding the door open. Six more came in, each holding the arm of a struggling bird kid. My heart stopped.

There was Fang, Iggy and Gazzy, looking very bruised and tired, but alive.

And here!

Angel and Nudge screamed in delight, Ari scowled. Fang scowled back, and Ari went and sat in a dark corner, as far away from Fang as possible.

'Get off me, can opener!' Fang snarled as said can opener shackled his ankle to a chain connected to the wall and cut his bonds. He lunged at it as soon as he was free, but it just jumped out of reach. Once the other Flyboys had chained up Iggy and Gazzy, they left the room and slammed the door.

'Fang!' I practically leapt into him. 'Don't ever leave again you jerk' I whimpered, hitting him in the shoulder. He just glanced over at Ari, gave me a nasty look and sat down as Nudge and Angel rushed into him.

'I'll just sit in a corner then,' Iggy sounded disappointed at the lack of attention, and we all rushed at him, then Gazzy. We swapped information, Fang not saying anything but letting Iggy and Gazzy fill in. When I had broken the news about Dr Martinez being my mother and Jeb being my father, Gazzy and Iggy had both gasped and commented on how it was great to know who they were, even if one of them was pure evil. Fang had no reaction. He just stared at the wall.

He was starting to get on my nerves. What did he have against Ari anyway? Okay, sure, he was always trying to kill us, had actually almost killed Fang a number of times, actually sent him to hospital once, he showed up at every opportunity and ruined everything… But he wasn't that person anymore. Fang didn't seem to get that.

After Fang, Iggy and Gazzy had scowled through the English version of the brain-washing recording, we sat, silent, wondering what to do next. Some Flyboys had tossed in some more bread, and we munched away quietly.

Eventually, after what seemed like forever, some Flyboys came in, attached some collars to Fang, Iggy and Gazzy, and led us out through the tunnels, back and forth. Now, I know robots didn't show emotion, but these flyboys were looking particularly smug. Whatever was about to happen, it was going to be very, very bad.


	3. Chapter 3

'Is this a football match?' Total asked in a low voice as we were led into an indoor _stadium_. 'With cheerleaders? I love cheerleaders.'

There was a huge area of grass in the middle of a large room, with what seemed to be grandstands on a small section of edge, and a large stage on the opposite side. The walls were covered with huge plasma screens, all of them showing huge images of the Director, who was standing on the stage.

'Somehow I don't think the Mad Whitecoats are squaring off against the Freedom Fighters' I said under my breath. We were standing on a small viewing area, twenty feet up one side of the stadium.

'What kind of final test?' Nudge asked, sounding apprehensive.

I sighed. 'Something asinine, probably life threatening, and guaranteed to make me furious every time I remember it.' I started breathing heavily, oxygenating my blood, tensing my knuckles, already prepared for lots of pain.

The rally was taking place in the middle of the stadium, where a large grate lay flush with the green grass. Everything was lit by huge lights, set high above on the roof, guarded by a steel mesh that was probably electrified. The mutants and wannabes we had marched with in the prison yard were standing in neat lines next to the grate. I picked out Max II, Nudge II and Angel II. There didn't seem to be a Fang II, an Iggy II or a Gazzy II. I had a brief moment to wonder why when the Director started speaking, her voice magnified to reach every corner of the stadium from unseen speakers.

'Welcome, everyone,' she said, arms held out wide. I looked in the direction she was facing, and realised the rows of seats were filled with people. Everything about them said 'government wanks,' and I figured they were here to be impressed, flattered and bribed, not necessarily in that order.

'Welcome, honoured guests of…' and then she launched into a large list of every country I'd heard of, and a bunch I hadn't.

'And now, prepare yourselves to view many of our most stunning achievements,' said the Director as she pressed a button on a raised platform next to her. Instantly, the grate in the middle of the stadium rumbled away, under the grass, so there was a huge hole in the ground.

_Great_, I thought. _My day's about to get worse_.  
Which, actually, come to think of it, was one of their most stunning achievements.

* * *

'Okay. I admit it. I am one, stunned, little dog.' We all nodded in agreement, even Fang looking awestruck.

I won't describe everything that we saw, because most of it would depress the heck out of you. Let's just say that if they were using their brilliance for _good_ instead of _evil_, cars would run off water vapour and leave fresh compost behind them; nobody would ever be ill, or hungry; all buildings would be earthquake-, flood- and bomb-proof, people would only own one set of clothes that changed shape or function you needed them to; and the world's entire economy would collapse and be replaced with one based on the value of chocolate.

However, since they _were_ evil, we just saw what would fuel the world's nightmares for the next thousand years.

'Next, we have one of our more successful human hybrids,' said the Director, as a totally normal looking woman walked out. Did she have wings? Was she an Eraser?

'Mara here had _Panthera pardus_ genetic material grafted onto her own human DNA. It's given her some, unique qualities.'

'What's that?' Angel Asked.

'Something feline,' Ari replied, but was rewarded by a dagger look from Fang.

He was right. Mara opened her mouth, which was displayed on all twelve of the cinema-sized screens around the stadium. _Huge_ fangs, razor sharp and deadly looking loomed around the stadium. Then she crouched down and leaped up, grabbing hold of a light post maybe 30 feet off the ground. Everyone who hadn't gasped when they saw her fangs stopped trying to be suave and went ahead and gasped. Dr. Janssen smiled and motioned her down.

'As usual, the leopard genes expressed themselves in some unexpected ways,' she said, meaning they still didn't know what the heck they were doing.

Mara leapt up onto the stage and turned around. The screens zoomed in as Dr. Janssen unzipped her jumpsuit at the back. Ol' Mara had leopard spots running down her spine.

'And Mara is just the beginning,' said the Director.


	4. Chapter 4

Growing up in a School, we'd seen pretty much any combination of two living things you could possibly imagine, and probably a thousand you couldn't. Hardly any made it past an embryo, and those who did survived for only a few months until their deficits caught up with them. As far as I knew, us, the Flock, had been by far the most successful hybrids. Us and the Erasers, but they only lived for about six years.

Today we were seeing many more successful hybrids. After Mara, the Director marched out two people who could change their skin colour just by thinking it. Two more could change their height, which, coupled with the skin changing type, was a recipe for a bank robber deluxe. They'd never be recognised.

There were people with hard, scaly, bulletproof skin, a woman who could scream at pitches too high for us to hear, but had Total writhing in agony on the floor. Her voice could break glass, which was nothing special. But it could also shatter metal, which was totally horrifying.

'Think of what a successful nag she would be,' I said, and Ari attempted a smile. I suddenly noticed his fur was very light grey. His time was very, very soon.

'Max? What's that?' Angel asked as she pointed at the stage. I looked. The Director seemed to have a remote control in her hand, and was surrounded by glittery bugs. She motioned to a man nearby, and he opened a cage. Hundreds of brightly coloured butterflies swarmed out of the cage, and scattered around the stadium. The glittery things weren't bugs. They were bullets with their own internal guidance systems. Seconds later, all that was left was a bright mess of wings floating down to the ground.

'What do they have against butterflies?' Nudge nearly screamed, outraged.  
'I think they were just an example. To show that those bullets are small, fast and can find the proverbial needle in the genetically modified haystack.

'Why, what happened? Iggy asked. Not being able to see a thing, Fang had been whispering every detail into his ear. Fang described it, and his unseeing eyes widened. We all stared down at the stadium in horror.

'And now we have saved the best for last,' the Director beamed, a look of total glee on her face. Uh oh. 'I give you…Generation Omega!'  
A boy came out. He looked younger than me, and was maybe a couple of inches shorter, but his muscles were heavily corded, and his silvery eyes gleamed under his pale brown hair. He looked at the crowd without expression.

'Omega is by far the most successful achievement we have made, greatly surpassing any hybrid ever made before,'

'Ouch,' Total muttered.

'In Omega lies our hopes and dreams for the future. To create a super race. He is they key to the hyper-developed human of tomorrow. He's immune to virtually every disease known, has super accurate reflexes and highly evolved strength. His intelligence tests off the charts for every intelligence scale devised, and has superior memory retention. He is truly Superman. And he's here to show you just how tough he is. That he is better than not just one, but _six_ obsolete but still somewhat successful human avian hybrids, and he will prove it by defeating them in a match to the death.' She turned and looked at me. 'Right, Max?'


	5. Chapter 5

Everyone looked at me. The Director, my Flock, the government wanks, and the mutants, all stared at me like I was going to say something. My blood was like ice in my veins.

Maximum Ride and her Flock will fight Omega to the _death_,' announced the Director happily, as if announcing Christmas.

'Max?' Nudge squealed, appalled. 'I don't have to fight him, do I?'

I buried my head in my hands, but quickly looked up again to see Omega doing one handspring after another, coming directly at our little viewing box. The whole Flock, except Total, but including Ari, snapped out their wings and launched themselves into the stadium. The Director seemed annoyed at Ari, but he didn't fall down electrocuted, so I assumed she didn't mind.

'Let the fight _begin_,' said the Director, sending chills down my spine. I was in combat mode, running on adrenaline, knuckles bulging, screaming towards Omega frighteningly fast. Just before impact, he knocked my fist away, grabbed my shirt and threw me into the ground. It hurt. He spun around and flipped over Fang as he charged too, grabbing him around the neck and throwing him back the way he had come. He hit the ground hard as Omega made a perfect landing.

Iggy couldn't do much, he was blind. He did delve into his pocket and pull out a small item about the same size as a small light bulb, and threw it. But Omega just grabbed it on its way down and smoothly threw it to one side, where it made an explosion about the size of a small missile. Iggy didn't throw any more bombs. Angel, Nudge and Gazzy were nowhere to be seen. I hoped Angel could do something with his mind, let us hit him or something.

I leapt to my feet, head swimming, and lunged at Omega again. He blocked a super fast flurry of punches, then landed a few of his own. God he was strong.

I nearly sank to my knees in pain. _Pain is just a message_. I straightened up. Fang came at Omega from behind, Ari from the side, and together we threw punch after punch at him. He blocked every single punch, picked Fang up like he was a rag doll and threw him into me, then kicked Ari's legs out from under him. I caught a glimpse of Angel high up, a look of concentration on her face.  
'Guys, up where he can't get us!' I yelled, and leapt into the air, Fang right behind me. Omega grabbed Ari, but he wrestled his arm out of Omegas grip and threw himself into the air. He obviously wasn't trained in up-and-aways, because he hit the ground again. He immediately started running, but Omega followed, very quickly catching up. Ari leapt into the air, Omega actually touching his feet as his target flew away.

We grouped about 50 feet above the stadium, Omega watching us with interest, but not attempting anything.

'Angel, can you do anything with him?' I asked.

'Um, his mind is really complex. Like a supercomputer. I can get in, and I can send stuff, but it just gets lost. I can't do much,' she said unhappily, sounding defeated.

'He's too fast for any of us to hit him,' Fang said solemnly.

'Well, then what can we do?'

'I could try and distract him for a bit. You know, just for a moment. Maybe then you guys can hit him!' Angel said brightly. Nudge looked a bit left out. I felt sorry for her, but there was nothing I could do right now.

'Okay Angel, you do that. Gazzy, see if the Flyboys obey the Directors voice. Fang, Ari, you're with me attacking. Nudge, guide Iggy away from trouble, and see what you can do,' I whispered, in case Omega had sensitive hearing too.

'Okay,' said Nudge, just as Fang disappeared in a shower of feathers, hit by a clump of dirt the size of my torso. Omega dug his powerful hands into the dirt again, ready to lift out another block to throw. The grass held it together, but it wasn't full of rocks or anything too hard. Not to fun to get hit by though, by the look of Fang, who was breathless, dirty and struggling to stay in the air.

We all launched into action. Angel shut her eyes, sweat forming on her brow. Gazzy flew in the direction of the small army of Flyboys that were gathered over one side, and Nudge led Iggy to the other side of the stadium.

Omega dropped the clump of dirt as I hit him in the chest. It would have caved in the chest of a normal human, but Omega just bent over slightly, grabbed my arm and threw me into the ground again. Ari launched into him from behind, knocking him off balance, and I jumped up and seized the opportunity to throw him to the ground myself.

He hit _hard_. It was like a ton of bricks hitting the ground. I felt the vibration, he was so heavy. Just from falling from his feet.

Fang tried a stomp on his chest, but he rolled out of the way, leapt to his feet as if he were light as a feather, and came roaring back at us. At the last minute, something made him pause. A look of confusion came over his face, but was almost immediately replaced with his normal stoic look. Not before I rushed at him and hit him right in the throat, which was unbelievably tough.

He coughed for a second, then threw an incredibly fast kick towards my neck, which I ducked but Fang got in the shoulder. He flew off his feet, landing several yards away.

'Max!' Nudge yelled from somewhere above. 'Come on! Quickly!'

I leapt into the air again, Fang doing the same, as Omega rushed at us. Suddenly, he was hit by a volley of bullets, which made him slow down, but they just bounced off his skin, little puffs of dirt erupting around him. It gave Ari enough time to get off the ground again.

Gazzy had got the Flyboys into the fight.

Still the Director didn't seem to mind. Jeez, how strong was this guy? Well, he proved just how strong when he punched _right through_ a Flyboy that was running at him. His hand went though its chest and erupted out its back, a grotesque image, made worse by the fact Omega's hand was now covered in black oil and a clear fluid.

Omega made short work of the robots, but it bought us enough time to get over to where Iggy was standing at the other side of the stadium, next to the wall.

'Well?' I asked. I expected a brilliant strategy, or a piece of vital information, but Iggy just motioned towards the wall. 'I don't see anything.'

'Neither do I,' Iggy replied smugly, and kicked the wall. It crumpled, leaving a small tunnel maybe four by four feet.

'Go, go, go!' I motioned everyone into the hole. Omega was sprinting towards us, going incredibly fast. Iggy went through before only me, and stuck something the size of a doughnut onto the side, which started beeping.

_Uh oh_ I had a moment to think, before I launched into the hole, and ran as fast as I could go.

_Boom_.

Debris blocked the tunnel, and the Director yelled in surprise, screaming at Omega to clear the debris. I heard what sounded like a rhino barging the crumbled wall, but the wall was what seemed to be loose rocks held in place by a steel barrier. So no way in through there. The people in the viewing platform were shouting, and more flyboys could be heard marching into the stadium. But all those sounds became nothing but muffled background noises as we descended.


	6. Chapter 6

'So what _is_ this place?' I asked after a while. I hadn't received any shocks from my collar, so I guessed either it was for effect, or the tunnel was lined with something a signal couldn't get through. Either way was good.

'No idea,' said Iggy helpfully. 'I just leaned against the wall and it made a funny noise. I felt the faint outline of a sealed tunnel around the edges. Someone had just welded a plate over the hole, smoothed it out and painted it.

Apparently it was a service tunnel, because it lead to a room with small robots hanging up, broken on the floor, dismantled on benches. Everything was covered with dust, suggesting nobody had been here in a while.

'It used to be… a robot depot. For cleaners. They kept the field clean and green, but something happened. Like, they made a grass that does all that for them,' Nudge said, touching a desk. I thought at how the grass was so green, with nothing but artificial lighting shining on it, and shuddered. It probably drank blood too.

'There are tools in here,' Fang said. 'We can use them to get the collars off.'

* * *

It was a brilliant idea. Until twenty precious minutes of looking for weak spot had passed, when no apparent means to remove it was visible. I sank back in frustration. 'There's no way to get it off. We can't use a hammer, there are no screws, or even a little groove to pry apart.'

Nudge looked at my collar, then touched it lightly. She held on and twisted the middle part, which slid aside at a seemingly invisible break, revealing a small number pad. She closed her eyes, waited a few seconds, then opened them again and typed quickly. There was a hiss and the collar fell off my neck.

'Oh. That's handy,' Gazzy said, his mouth open.

'You're almost as scary as Angel sometimes, you know that?' I whispered. Nudge beamed at me.

* * *

After Nudge had 'felt' the code for all our collars and given me the code for hers, we crept through the hallways of the castle, praying we didn't run into someone. We did.

'Max!' Jeb said in a hushed whisper.

'_Father_,' I said snidely, but he ignored me.

'Max, now is the time. Time to _save the world_. Take that door, follow the hallway to the end. There are many traps and doors, but you are ready. _You can do it_!'

'Right. And _how_ am I supposed to know what to do when I get there?'

'You will know what to do Max. Your flock is more powerful than you give them credit for.'

'I know my flock is powerful enough to kick your butt from here to next Tuesday.'

'Max, we need to go,' Fang's urgent voice said. When Fang had urgency in his voice, it usually meant something bad.

I took a glance at Jeb and led my flock down the corridor, running the whole way and leaving Jeb behind. He could sort out his own mess.

* * *

It took several minutes to get there, but none of us were even breathing hard when we got to a _huge_ door. Well, _huge_ doesn't even begin to describe just how big it was. Basically, it was the size of a basketball court tipped into one end. There was a smaller door over to one side, about the size of your average household door, so we ran over to it.

'There's no knob, or keyhole. How do we open it?' Fang asked urgently.

'Iggy, come here.' I motioned Iggy over. His delicate fingers brushed the surface of the door, and then over a particular spot.

'There is a vibration behind here. Something electronic at this spot.' He tapped a part about halfway up the right of the door, and Nudge came over and touched it.

'There is something that happens here… People…swiping cards? An electronic lock?'

'Great.' We were foiled at the first door just because we didn't have the key.

'Hey, who are you? Vat are you doing? Are you experiments? Why are you not vearing collars?' A man in a white coat and thick glasses said in a heavily accented voice, and started running down the hallway.

I assumed a battle position as he got nearer, Fang and Ari coming up on either side of me.

The whitecoat slowed down, then pulled a small device out of a pocket. It looked like a remote control, covered in buttons and a speaker. He pushed something, and looked up to see my fist smacking into his face.

'What is it, Dr Herwig? Is something wrong?' said a voice coming from a speaker on the device, which was still in the whitecoat's hand.

'Gazzy, get _over_ here,' I whispered more forcefully than I intended, and Gazzy came over.

He picked it up and spoke into it. 'Nussing is vong. I just accidentally leant on ze device and it must haf pushed a button. It von't happen again,' Gazzy said in a perfect imitation of the whitecoat, who was out cold on the floor.

'That is four times this week, Dr Herwig. Be advised that your pay _will_ be docked and you will report to the Director at oh-eight hundred tomorrow. Don't be late.'

'Yes, madam. I von't be late.'

Oh, cool,' said Angel, as she ruffled through the whitecoat's pockets. She held up a small brown piece of plastic with a flashing light on it. It was an electronic key, I recognised from a movie I saw once. Yes, most of my education comes from TV and the internet. Take a moment to give thanks for your education, people!

The whitecoat groaned and tried to get up, but Fang clapped him on the temples and he sank back down again.

Angel held the key up to the spot Iggy had found earlier, and the door swung open soundlessly.

_I knew you could do it, Max_ said the Voice.

_Shut up Jeb_ I thought back.


	7. Chapter 7

What was beyond the door was rewarded by six gasps and twelve eyes widening to the size of bicycle wheels, Iggy tugging at Fang's shirt to get him to fill him in, without success. It was a hanger about the size of _four_ football stadiums. It was divided into hundreds of isles running down it, and, stacked on top of each other, about a hundred feet high, were _Flyboys_. There had to be at least a couple of million here, hanging up with a cord plugged into their leg, their eyes open but with no red glow. Something on this scale would need an incredible amount of power to run.

'Imagine the electricity bill,' I said dumbly. Nobody answered.

'Come on,' growled Ari, who had snapped out of it. One by one, we shook out heads and were once again on full alert. I noticed a door on the other side of the hanger, several hundred feet away.

'Over there guys,' I said, pointing, then took a running takeoff, my huge wings snapping out and blowing dust off the floor. We covered the hanger in about three minutes. Which was incredible seeing as we seemed to be going at least a hundred miles an hour. But I'd never flown indoors before, so it may have seemed faster. At any rate, you still have _no idea _how huge this place was.

The door was locked, as to be expected, but Angel just flashed the key at a small black pad set into the wall beside it and it clicked open. Through that was what appeared to be a security checkpoint. Big strong doors with no means of opening, cameras everywhere, an unoccupied desk over to one side.

Iggy went over to the doors and put his ear up against it.

'I hear voices,' he said and we all went on hyper-alert. 'Laughing. Like they're on a coffee break.'

'So how are we gonna get through these doors?' I asked pointlessly.

As if in answer to my question, the doors suddenly slid open, and a whitecoat walked though, looking behind him and talking to someone.

'Haha, okay, I'll come by after my shift is over,' he was saying, then stopped abruptly as he noticed that there were six kids and a greying wolf-kid looking at him.

He never stood a chance. The other man through the door, however, had ample time to hit a button on his desk before he was knocked senseless by Ari.

'Let's figure out how to shut these doors,' I said quickly, and Nudge ran over and put her hand on the keyboard.

_Clunk_

'That didn't sound good...' Nudge said slowly.

I watched on a small screen as a Flyboy charged through the door to the hangar, followed by another, and another. Everyone except Angel and Nudge threw themselves into action, blocking and attacking. Nudge started typing quickly, and Angel searched the guard, finding a baton, which she swung at a Flyboy, with little effect.

'Nudge! Shut the doors!' I yelled, and Nudge's typing became more furious, her fingers a blur over the keyboard.

'I gotta bypass a few systems first! Buy me some time!' she shouted back, as I snapped the head off a Flyboy, which abruptly fell to the ground, but another one jumped into it's place. There were too many of them.

Duck, dodge, block, punch, kick, grab, pull, duck, _ow_, punch, kick, it was endless. There was no way we were going to last long like this.

'Pile them up at the door!' I yelled, and we slowly started advancing. Flyboys were littering the ground, and now they were piling up at the door. The flow slowed.

'Get inside _now_!' Nudge suddenly screamed at us, and we all threw our Flyboys back a few paces and bolted through the thick doors, which were closing rapidly. Not a moment too soon, too, we were all growing very weary and Ari was bleeding profusely.

It was too good to be true, right? Right. A Flyboy wedged itself between the closing doors, where it was almost immediately crushed, but another one used the time to get a grip with its hairy claws and start to pry them open again, where it was quickly joined by others.

Screeching in protest, smoke streaming from where it slid into the wall, the door slowly began to open again. Just as the gap became wide enough to fit a Flyboy through, and one was getting ready to jump, Ari, roaring like there was no tomorrow, leapt though, crashing into them, the door snapping shut.

'ARI!' Angel and I yelled at the same time, and we all gathered around the small screen that showed Ari hopelessly fighting so many Flyboys.

'Open the doors again,' I instructed Nudge.

'NO!' yelled Fang, and pulled her away from the computer.

'What is _wrong_ with you?!' I yelled back at him. 'He just sacrificed himself to save us!'

'And that shouldn't be in vain! There are far too many for just us to fight, we would be taken in seconds,' he snapped back with cold logic. I nearly screamed in frustration. I hated logic.

'I can't open them yet anyway,' Nudge said. 'It has a failsafe so that it can't be opened within three minutes of-'

'Nudge!' I cut her off. We all looked back at the screen.

Ari was still fighting like a berserker, tearing into Flyboys like, well, a wolf into it's prey. The room was getting clogged with bodies. In fact, no more could even get in because of the huge pile at the door. There were still a few left in the room, but Ari was still fighting strong.

Then, without warning, Ari's legs just…gave up. He crumpled to the floor, a look of confusion on his face. There were two Flyboys left, and he grabbed one by the ankle and swung it into the other one. They hit the floor in a tangled mess. Only one of them came back out of it.  
It strode up to Ari, facing away from the screen. Even on the low quality camera, I could plainly see Ari struggling to move, to get up and fight. He was not succeeding, but only managed to drag himself up against a wall. There was no audio, but I could see Ari's mouth moving.

The Flyboy stopped in it's tracks and fell over. Just like that. We waited a few moments that seemed an eternity, then a light blinked on. Nudge hit a button and the doors slowly opened.


	8. Chapter 8

'Ari!' I yelled as I ran up to where he was lying, blood streaming from his mouth.

'Deactivation code. Bit long to say while they're attacking you, and I don't know how to get the new one,' he said in a weak voice.

'Ari, I don't care. You saved us. Thank you,' I whispered, and hugged him. His face softened, tears forming in his eyes.

'Ari,' Fang said in a firm voice and walked up behind me. I hoped he wasn't going to make a misery out of the last minutes of Ari's pathetic existence.

He walked up and crouched down. 'Ari, you made our lives hell. You showed up at the worst of times and ruined everything.' Ari's face fell.  
I was reaching for Fang's neck, ready to drag him out of there, but he gently pushed my hand away.

'It was easy to forget the little boy you were.' My throat closed up. Was Fang forgiving Ari? It was certainly the most emotional speech he'd ever made. 'I was always jealous of you. You were normal, didn't live in a cage, I guess I thought you were taunting me. Then when you came back…' Tears were forming in everyone's eyes.

'You hated us. But I realise now that wasn't you. That was the product of the whitecoat's experiments and training. Now you are the little kid I used to know.' He ruffled Ari's hair, and Ari looked like he was about to sob, his face a mixture of pain, memories, happiness and sadness, and lots of blood.

'Thank you. For doing what you just did.' I nearly fainted. That was the first time I'd ever heard those words leave Fang's mouth. Well, the first time he actually meant it.

'Fang,' Ari croaked. 'I guess we wanted to be each other. I was jealous of how… perfect you were, your wings. And you were jealous of my freedom. When I was…turned into an Eraser, it was like Christmas. I would be powerful, but even then I was a failure.' He held up one Eraser mitt to make his point. 'You were still perfect. I hated that, hated that I would never be like you, and then you ran away with my father, leaving me behind. But I understand now. You just wanted to be free. I just wanted your wings, but what you went through to get them…I see now that I was being greedy. I wasn't grateful of what I already had.'

Even Fang had tears in his eyes now, and Angel's and Nudges lips were on the verge of quivering.

'I'm sorry. For everything,' he finished, and Gazzy sniffled.

'Me too, Ari. Me too,' Fang agreed, holding out his hand. Ari took it, smiling, tears streaking down his face. It was the happiest moment of my life, even happier than when Jeb had stolen us from the School.

After that touching scene, we were interrupted by a flyboy tumbling down the huge mess in the door.

'Everyone through, I'll disable the lock' said Nudge, snapping back into action. The moment was, however, ruined by the tear streaks all down her face and on her clothes.

'You are a very scary girl,' I said, the tears running down my face ruining the moment too. We all took a moment to wipe them off before saying a final goodbye to Ari, kisses from the girls, hand shakes from the guys, he wished us a final 'Good luck,' and we were off, running away from the one true friend of my flock.

* * *

'Wait!' Iggy suddenly yelled about two minutes later, his voice echoing around us. The white hallways had been immediately replaced by a dark corridor, lit by dull yellow lights. The walls and floor were made of lumpy bricks. The whole scene was very medieval.

'What is it?' I asked as we all skidded to a halt.

'Something…mechanical,' he said slowly. 'DUCK!'


	9. Chapter 9

We all dove for cover as a steel blade whipped past us at chest height. I immediately looked up to see that, thankfully, no-one had been hit.

Then the _floor_ slid away, and we all jumped forward, hoping to god we weren't landing on another moving floor. We weren't.

I cautiously edged over to the new hole in the floor, and gasped, pulling the rest of the flock away.

Inside were _bodies_. Most of them had white coats on, others a security uniform. All of them were cut in half. The floor slid back across as we moved along, and I turned around to look. I now saw the bloodstains on the bricks, blending nearly perfectly with the dark stone. Nearly.

'Do I want to know what was in there?' Fang asked quietly.

'No.' But he probably guessed.

We proceeded with much more caution from then on. It was slow, because instead of running, we made as little noise as possible so Iggy could hear anything coming, and Nudge walked with her hand on the wall, her ability to feel past occurrences warning us when our heads were about to be removed.

There were a lot more traps. I won't go into detail, but there were spike pits, more blades, boulders, a deadly maze where spikes jutted from the walls if you made a wrong turn, flame throwers, snares that jumped up from bricks to catch ankles and drag them down into a pit where they would die of starvation, and a lot more.

Between Iggy and Nudge, we navigated every trap and puzzle in about half an hour, before we came to another large door. It was about the size of a large car tipped onto the rear bumper bar. There was no other way through except for a small vent too small for any of us to get through.

Angel tried the electronic key all over the door and the little black panel next to it, but apparently, the whitecoat we had appropriated it from didn't have the privileges to open it.

'Great. Now what?' Fang said casually.

'Hmm. Any ideas anyone?' Everyone shook their heads. 'Well, crap.'

Iggy suddenly tensed. I listened intently. _There._ A slight scuffling noise. Coming from above?

I looked up, and saw there was another vent above us, protruding from the roof. Something was crawling along it. It sounded too big to be a rat.

'What is it?' Nudge whispered.

'I hear metal on metal,' Iggy whispered back. We all assumed a battle position, fearing a swarm of mini Flyboys.

The scuffling was nearly at the vent right on top of us. 'Ouch, son of a-'

'Total!' Angel yelled, jumping up the ten feet to the vent, pushing the grate up and aside and grabbing onto the edge of the opening in one swift movement, before anyone could stop her. There was some more scrabbling, and Angel fell back down to the ground, holding a small black bundle of fur. There was a collar around it, a small metal disc hanging from it.

'Yeah, thanks guys, way to leave me behind with all those Flyboys. I was worried sick. I couldn't see a thing except when you flew into the air, and then when I heard all the shouting, I jumped into the nearest vent,' he said, clearly very annoyed. 'You are _not_ getting me into one of those things any time soon,' he added, licking his paw.

'Um, well, actually,' Angel said, glancing at the small vent near the door.

Total sighed. 'The things I do for you kids,' he muttered as Fang wrenched the grate from it's housing, rusted screws giving way. Total crawled inside, cursing like a sailor with a broken mast before Angel reminded him to shut up. We waited anxiously for about five minutes before he came back, a card in his mouth, which he spat out as soon as his head was out of the vent. It was attached to a cheap blue strap which looked like it had been gnawed through.

'Ugh. Fibres,' he muttered, trying to spit them out.

'Thank you Total,' Angel said sweetly, kissing his head. He licked her face happily, leaving a blue line on it, which Angel pulled off, grimacing.

Fang took the card and swiped it across the black pad next to the door. Nothing.

'Try again,' said Total, and this time, a small beep was accompanied by a very robotic voice.

'Card authorised. Begin voice recognition.'

_Uh oh_, I had time to think before Gazzy stepped forward, and in a perfect imitation of the Director, said 'Open up!'

The door rumbled open, and we were greeted by a sleeping guard slouched at a desk, crumbs on a plate near a computer.

I looked down at the door, seeing that the vent opened up a little further from the door than on the other side, which looked like it stretched away from the door.

'It took you five minutes to go a few feet?' I raised my eyebrows at Total.

'I also had to steal the key off the guard.' I looked at the guard. There was a blue strap hanging from his belt that had been gnawed through. It was about a foot above the ground. I looked back at Total.

'And eat his croissant,' he said, looking away.

I nearly hit the damn dog. 'Angel, what are you picking up from the guard?'

'Um, he's dreaming. About…turning off all the Flyboys. He thinks the By Half plan is a bad idea, but he's too scared to do anything. He thinks they'll kill him.'

'He's probably right,' I agreed. 'Let's find out some stuff.'

I nodded at Fang and he moved without a sound, not even Iggy seemed to notice him move. He quickly covered the room and grabbed the guard's hands, yanked them behind his back and pulled his chair away from the desk.

'Huh? I, what? What's happening? Oh kids. I must be dreaming.' He closed his eyes again, but opened them again when I strode across the room and slapped him in the face.

'Ow! Hey, what? Who are you people?'

'I'm going to ask you some questions, and you are going to answer,' I said very menacingly, and he instantly cowered. 'One. How do Itex plan on killing half the population?'

He just looked scared, so Angel stepped forward and his face turned into horror.

'They…plan on releasing the robots, and they will…argh…' he said, obviously trying his hardest not to say anything. 'They will kill everyone who can't prove they have a special ability. These new ones also have…they can…detect illnesses…' he continued through gritted teeth.

'Oh, well that's just great,' I said. 'How do we stop them?'

'You can't-' he began, but a look from Angel changed his mind. 'They are all…hooked up to a generator. If the generator surges, they will…all be destroyed.'

'Oh, that's handy,' Angel said.

'I thought you were telling him to say that,' I said in surprise.

'Nope. Just to tell the truth. He wasn't thinking about the generator, so I didn't know about it,' she said casually.

Mental note. Keep closer check on more-freakish-than-usual-six-year-old.

The guard lunged at the desk, coming an inch from kicking a small red button on the underside. Fang clapped him on the temple and he sank off his chair.

'Great. Nice one Fang,' I said sarcastically. He grinned at me. 'Now what?'

'I'm hungry,' Nudge suddenly said. Of course. We'd had nothing but a few bits of bread to eat for the last two days, and we were all running low on energy.

Angel opened a large drawer at the guard's desk and pulled out a bag of croissants. There had to be at least fifty large pastries in the drawer, all of them very sugary and fatty. There were cream puffs, boxes of doughnuts, bagels, and some little buttery pastries that none of us had any idea about, but were very tasty.

Everything was gone in about two minutes. What? I couldn't save the world on an empty stomach! That's like riding a bull without holding on. You just can't do it.

After eating the guard's stash of goodies, we pressed on. Who knew saving the world would take so long?

Just beyond a little corridor, there was an elevator.

'God, talk about having to conquer your fears,' Fang mused. We all hated elevators. They were small and boxed in, and the bad guys could stop you between floors and drop a bomb or something onto it.

Which was more than likely to happen here, of all places. So we pressed the button and it opened, and Iggy did some fancy work with the outer door, but leaving the inner one. Fang reached around and hit the only button, darting back out quicker than I thought he could move. The inner doors closed, and the lift descended, leaving the outer doors open and a gaping abyss disappearing into blackness.

'I'm not going to ask how you knew what to do there,' I told Iggy, trying to hide my amazement. Apparently it didn't work.

'You _should_ be amazed. I had to bypass three safeguards and six alarms just to get the doors to stay open without anyone knowing.' Nudge raised an eyebrow.


	10. Chapter 10

Fang motioned towards a ladder on the far wall of the shaft.

'After you.'

'How kind of you,' I said, grinning, and he grinned back. Nudge rolled her eyes, and Angel elbowed her.

After what seemed like _forever_ of climbing, my foot bumped the edge of the motionless elevator. My hands were stiff, refusing to open and close properly, and my arms ached. We had to have been climbing down for at least forty minutes, and although progress was probably quicker than a normal human, it was still very slow, about walking speed. The shaft wasn't big enough for us to open our wings, let alone spiral down, and using the elevator, which we were now standing on, was out of the question.

In the near pitch-black darkness, I could clearly see Fang flexing his fingers, frowning at them. Iggy came down with Total in one hand, who he dropped onto the elevator, and started searching for an opening in the roof. Nudge, Gazzy and Angel stayed on the ladder so it wasn't so crowded.

We dropped through the hole Iggy opened up using an explosive because there was no service panel, and quickly jumped out. We were met by a large room full of blinking lights and computers. A doorway with a very solid-looking door, which was slightly poking out of the wall, lead into a wide tunnel, maybe twenty feet across. I peeked inside and there was a window on one side, and through there was _another hangar of Flyboys_.

God, there's another hangar,' I said. Nudge nodded solemnly, and pointed towards a screen. It had "12 out of 24 storage bays fully charged. Remaining 12 at 80 charge" displayed on the screen.

'There are _twenty four_ hangars of those things?!' Gazzy said, sounding like a kitten on helium. The rest of us just stood there gaping. If anyone was sceptical about killing half the population with an army, I invite you to come and have a look at just how big these hangars were, and there were _twenty four_ of them.

Nudge shook her head and sat down at a computer. After a few minutes of fast typing, she was in. Some more typing revealed that overloading the generator was not possible from any computer, but required the destruction of a regulator, which was so incredibly unstable it was kept as far away from headquarters as possible. Twenty miles, to be exact.

She managed to download some schematics, and we ignored the top floors of the castle and skipped to the bottom, where we saw the room we were in, "Control Room", and the tunnel, which was the "Observation Corridor" that lead to the "Generator", which was a long way from the control room. All along the corridor were more hangars, at least twenty. The others were kept above ground to provide security when needed.

'Okay guys, how do we overload this damn thing?' I asked nobody in particular.

'There's no button on it that I can find on the schematics,' said Nudge. 'Or any valve, or anything really.'

'Of course. That only works in the movies.' I suddenly noticed that Iggy was fumbling with his jacket. He finally got it off, took off his shirt and reached an arm behind his back. We all watched with interest.

'Yes, I know, I'm just so interesting to look at,' he smirked, sensing it. He untucked one wing slightly and reached under it, pulling out a flat package wrapped in foil with a watch on strapped to the top, wires poking out and into the foil. 'We made it in the caves before the Flyboys got to us,' he said as Gazzy hissed in a breath.

'Yeah, that'll do it,' Gazzy said, very tensely. 'I didn't know that was with us the whole time. I thought they would have searched you. They searched me.

'They did search me,' Iggy replied, as if hiding a bomb the size of a dinner plate was nothing big.

'Oh okay.'

'Um, all this time, from when Fang and I left you, you've had a _bomb_ under your _wing_?!' I nearly shouted. Nearly.

'Yup,' he said happily, handing it to me. Just press the bottom right button on the watch. Um, the countdown timer only went up to two minutes, so get out of there fast.'

'No way. You arm your own bombs,' I said, pushing it back, but Fang cut me off.

'Max, if we only have two minutes, none of us are going to get that far. That's what, ten minutes of flying as fast as we can. You have to use your power Max. The rest of us have used _our_ powers. Now it is time to use yours.

'What if I don't make it?' I asked, not meaning to let a touch of fear enter my voice. Normally fear isn't something I have for anything, but there was something about flying in a corridor being chased by a ball of fire that didn't appeal to me.

_You have to Max. It is your destiny_.

_How nice of you to drop in_ I thought back, but Jeb didn't reply.

'Max,' Fang said, his words so soft and most un-Fanglike. 'You can do it. I know you can.'

'The corridor is twenty miles. That means you should be about halfway by the time the bomb goes off. The displaced air will be awkward to fly with, but think of it like flying upwards with a really huge updraft. It should lend you significant speed. It won't be too bad because it will probably break the windows and find some escape through there, and there'll probably be some vents at the generator too. Even so, with your already unnatural speed you should hit at least three hundred and fifty miles an hour.' Iggy said, thinking.

My jaw fell open. There was no way I could fly in a tight corridor at three hundred and fifty miles an hour. 'No way, _no way!_' I said, and walked through the door into the corridor, gazing unseeingly at the rows of Flyboys. What could I do? I ran through every scenario in my head. I couldn't think of anything else to do, but every time I thought about Iggy's plan I pictured myself crashing into a wall at three hundred and fifty miles an hour before being consumed by a massive fireball.

Fang came in after me, and put a hand on my arm. 'Max.'

I looked at him. His face was softer. Normally it was very set, his eyebrows angled slightly downwards, making him look so serious. Now they were relaxed, and his mouth wasn't set, but softer, in a little smile. I had never seen Fang like this. He looked like an actual fourteen year old. A good looking fourteen year old.

'What have you done with Fang?' I asked cautiously, and he chuckled, as only Fang can chuckle. We started walking further down the corridor, Fang glaring back to make sure any little faces were removed from the doorway.

'Max, I don't know how you do what you do. While I was off with Gazzy and Iggy, I learned that it was hard being the leader. You manage to do that with twice the number I had to take care of. You do that _and_ manage to get through this sick little game of world domination. You are an incredible person, Max.'

He was starting to sound like Jeb. Except something made me believe his words. They sounded so sincere, like after hearing them, I could do anything.

'Fang. What are you going to do if-' I started, but stopped before I started crying.

He stopped walking. I looked at him and tried to read his thoughts, but his face was it's usual self again.

'I will do my best to take care of everyone,' he said softly after a while. 'But I won't have to.'

'Thank you,' I whispered and instinctively moved towards him. I was almost immediately surrounded by a firm embrace.

Once again I felt his cool, firm lips on mine. He wrapped his arms around me and stroked my shoulder where my wing joined my back, but I had lost contact with my arms, they were doing their own thing. I felt like I was floating, floating in a world where nothing mattered except we were together, me and Fang. I was invincible, nothing could hurt me now we were together.

It still felt weird, kissing the guy who had been my best friend for my entire life, but none of that mattered. I didn't care what my flock thought of us, if they caught us, how I was going to save the world, heck, the thought that Angel could read my mind didn't even occur to me.

Nothing mattered, just that me and Fang were together.

Eventually we broke apart, and I quickly spun to check on the door. No little faces were peeking through, and despite my total carelessness during that moment, I prayed silent thanks to a God I didn't really believe in.


	11. Chapter 11

I strode back into the control room with an air of confidence around me. 'Gimme that bomb,' I said firmly. Iggy soundlessly handed it to me.

'Whatever you said, it worked,' I heard him whisper to Fang.

'I'm a very motivational speaker,' he whispered back.

'Yeah, you with your _blog_,' I said as I zipped the bomb into my jacket, and Iggy sniggered.

'Good luck,' said Angel cautiously, as if my life depended on a few words, and pretended to hand me something. I suddenly remembered she was six. We had been through so much, and she had been so brave, she had seemed as old as Iggy and Fang.

'Take it back. I won't need it,' I said, handing it back. She looked a bit more confident in me. 'But thanks anyway.' She smiled.

I hugged every member of my flock, trying to give Fang the same deal as everyone else. I don't know how good I did. Nobody seemed to notice anything, anyway.

I stepped through the door, positioned myself in the middle of the room and slowly extended my wings. I took a running takeoff and poured on the speed. It wasn't really that hard. The air was very still, and it was a dead straight corridor. My wings had a few feet on either side, so there was some room for error.

I occasionally took glances through the windows. There were so many Flyboys, millions and millions. The world didn't stand a chance. There had to be more Flyboys in this castle than troops in every army on the Earth put together.

* * *

It took about five minutes to get there. I think. I don't know, it might have been more. But it took awhile considering I was underground. I couldn't imagine how long it would have taken to mine it all out, and how expensive it would have been.

It was impressive. The generator, I mean. It was a huge indoor _power plant_. Underground. I could see it through a thick glass window, like the ones looking at the hangars. I tapped it. It as rock solid. It would take a lot to break it, I realised, and that meant I'd have to cope with a larger burst of wind. Great.

Not for the first time, I considered going back, but I had a job to do. I pressed on. Tearing my gaze away from the power plant, I saw a door with "Current Regulator: WARNING do not enter" written in large letters. I ignored the other doors, which I supposed led to another computer room and the power plant, and strode through. In the middle of a large room that was tiny in comparison to the hangars, a large cylinder stretched up.

It was huge, and had little protrusions here and there. I busily started packing the bomb into a notch, and hit the button.


	12. Chapter 12

I ran.

Oh, god I ran. Through the door, get some speed, _snap_, in the air, fly fly fly, pour on the speed.

My fear may have boosted my unnatural acceleration of my unnatural power. My wings were a blur, entire hangars went by in seconds rather than minutes. The window frames were zooming past too fast to see, so one wall seemed like a giant window to the lifeless army.

I snapped back into focus before I lost count of time. _Keep your mind on the job, Max!_ I couldn't see where my wingtips reached, so I just had to look ahead and try to stay centred.

1:50, 1:51…

Oh god here it comes…

1:57…What was I up to? 1:58?

_Boom_.


	13. Chapter 13

Ari sat against the wall, resigned to his fate. He went over everything in his life, thought of what would have happened if he had been helping Max instead of trying to kill her, what it would have been like if Jeb had loved Ari as much as Max, if he were in Max's position, taking care of a flock and saving the world at the same time.

He was growing weaker. Already the corners of his vision were fading into darkness, and his arms were beginning to grow limp by his sides. His fur was falling from his face and chest, and he was half-morphed, having lost control.

A figure walked into the room, through the destroyed door the a Flyboy had cut through with a blow torch. The Flyboys had completely ignored Ari, sensing he was near his end anyway.

The figure paused as it noticed Ari, and he looked up.

'Ari,' Jeb whispered.

'I'm sorry father. I failed,' Ari croaked, hanging his head again. 'I couldn't help Max any more.'

'Oh, son, I'm so sorry if you think that way. You have not failed me. Today, you have made me proud to be your father. You did an act that very few people would do. And because of that, Max was able to continue.

'But why are we talking about Max? We always talk about Max, Ari. I think it's time we talk about you.'

Ari looked up again, and his breath caught in his throat. Jeb was kneeling in front of him, looking at Ari the same way he always looked at Max.

'Ari, I was just so caught up in my work. I had a mission, to guide Max, but that blinded me from what mattered. From you. I'm so sorry I never spent any time with you, and to tell you that you mean more to me than anything in this world. You mean as much to me as Max.' He was smiling, and Ari fought back tears.

'All I wanted was for someone to love me. You were always around Max, comforting her, easing the pain. I was a nobody. When you ran away, I couldn't take it, then when you came back, when you looked at me for the first time in four years, you turned away. I was a failure. Just another experiment, not as your son. Even when Max was gone, you paid her more attention than me. I can never forgive you, father. It's too late. I'm sorry.'

Jeb looked pained, but understanding. Ari felt guilty about saying that, but it was what he felt.

Jeb suddenly leaned in and hugged Ari, for the first time since Ari could remember. 'I understand, son. I understand.'

Ari suddenly felt…hollow. Empty, his arms fell limp against his sides, and then a rumble made the walls shake, knocking Jeb off balance. Ari fell onto his side, his last thoughts of Max, and how she was the only person that had ever cared about him, before slipping into the blissful darkness.


	14. Chapter 14

I came so close to hitting the ground.

Really, my chin and hand skimmed it, took a heap of skin off. But I somehow managed to pull myself back into the air.

Flying with an explosion behind you is more difficult than it sounds. At least the effects were staggered. First came the initial warning breeze, then the actual shockwave, followed by the rush of expanding air, and finally, the resonating _boom_.

If I thought I was going fast before, it was nothing compared to what I was going now. I half expected to break the sound barrier. I didn't dare turn back because I knew I had to slow down before I hit the opposing wall of the control room. Which was rapidly approaching. I could just make out Fang standing at the door.

The Flyboys were passing too quick to see, but most of them were on the ground.

Excellent.

I kept going as long as I thought I could. As it turned out, I was going a little fast when I skidded straight into Fang, bowling him over. Nudge shut the door behind us and scrambled into the elevator, where she was pulled up by Iggy, followed by me and finally Fang.

'Wait…just let me…catch my breath…' I said in between gasps for air.

'No time, they know where we are now, especially if they noticed on the elevator camera fifteen minutes ago. They will be coming.'

Contrary to that notion, the elevator jolted into motion, taking us with it.

'Aw jeez, can't we get just one break? Just a little one?' Gazzy moaned.

'What are our options?' I asked nobody in particular. 'We could ride the elevator up, which would be quicker, but I don't want to be sitting on it when they find the hole in the roof.

Iggy sniggered. Boys.

'They'll search the whole shaft when they find that. If we're below the elevator, we'll be trapped. And they'll have the height advantage,' Fang said coolly. 'Stopping the elevator achieves the same thing. Fighting our way out probably isn't the best option either, they probably brought Omega along to finish the job.' I noticed his hand move to his chest briefly, though he quickly covered it by scratching his other arm.

At least he hadn't fainted from blood loss yet and fell two thousand feet.

'Okay, ride the elevator, when we get there, keep climbing. There might be another floor or a vent or something.'

So we waited it out. It was actually rather relaxing, assuming I could forget about whatever was waiting for us at the top, and that there might not be any escape from it. And that Fang didn't take his eyes off me. Neither did Angel, which always creeped me out.

We got to the top and all jumped onto the ladder, climbing as fast as we could, out of the beam of light shining from the big hole in the roof. We didn't get far.

'Now what?' I hissed. There were voices below us and faces peering through the hole. Thankfully we were in the dark.

'Get ready to move,' Fang said with a tone I really didn't like, mainly because it meant that he was about to do something exactly like what he did.

He kicked a grate off a vent.

'Move move move!' We slid into the vent like water going down the drain, quickly and smoothly. Gone within seconds. I noticed there wasn't a breeze so we probably weren't going to meet any fans, thankfully, but it also meant we weren't going outside.

No, that would be too easy, wouldn't it? Heck, it was easy enough that were were climbing through the clichéd ventilation system in the mysterious castle of the demonic forces of evil. Seriously. If anyone cracks a joke at that, I swear...

I sighed and shuffled along behind Fang.

If I hear one joke about that either...

* * *

Omega glared at the roof, ignoring the gibbering security and scientists. Without so much as a glance at them, he started following the ever so quiet shuffling noises coming from above.


	15. Chapter 15

'Are we there yet?' Nudge moaned.

'Aw, shaddup,' I replied, nudging her with my foot. I won't bore you with our journey through the vents, but it involved lots of intersections, a few dead ends, and a circle.

Eventually we found an exit that didn't lead to a room full of whitecoats, but into a large indoor pool. Its murky depths exceeded what we could see, even though we normally see clearly through the darkest water. Another avian characteristic.

Though we could see viewing windows and decompression chambers all down one side.

An experimental chamber for aqueous subjects.

'Ugh, these people sicken me,' I said and everyone nodded.

'Out!' Fang suddenly yelled and I had a moment of panic.

Time froze.

Okay, Omega at the door, running at us faster than I could imagine, vent behind us but too far away to reach and get into in time, no other exits, not enough room to stay up out of reach, but we couldn't fight him either.

No choice.

We all knew there was no other escape, so nothing needed to be said. Angel and Nudge flew across the pool, Fang, Iggy and I launched ourselves at him, but he was too good.

Sensing Iggy's weakness, he took him out first. He threw a punch, which Iggy blocked, but he didn't hear the kick Omega threw at his stomach a second later. He dropped and stayed down.

At the same time, he was blocking attacks coming from me and Fang, even though we had him surrounded. He apparently had Iggy's ability to hear attacks.

Finished with Iggy, he turned to the leader of our troop.

I blocked as many as I could, but fell under his reign of attacks. Beaten in seconds. Though I noted Fang wasn't attacking anymore.

That's because he was about to crash into Omega from above. Which he did with all the finesse of a brick..

Omega was the first to recover. Clapping Fang in the head, he glanced over to the wall, and grinned wickedly. The first I'd ever seen him show any emotion.

I struggled to move, to get up and fight, but fell to the ground in agony. I watched, helpless and out of breath as Omega dragged Fang to a shelf of tools, picked out a particularly heavy tool box and attached it to Fang's foot with a couple of cable ties.

Realising his intentions, I screamed and found the energy to launch myself at him again, but he threw me off. My repeated attempts had as much effect as he carried Fang over to the pool, the heavy toolbox dangling from his ankle obviously causing him much pain.

Angel, Gazzy and Nudge had joined in, and Iggy mustered some strength to help. I was going for every pressure point and weakness I knew, but we were nothing but flies to him. We tried our best, all screaming and Fang now alert enough to struggle drowsily, tears flowing from all our eyes.

But our best wasn't enough to stop him from tossing Fang into the pool, where the toolbox dragged him down to its dark depths.

I screamed in a mixture of a war cry and despair and dived into the icy water. My legs froze up quickly, and my descent slowed. I briefly noticed the same happening to Gazzy and Nudge in my peripheral before Fang's face forever burned itself in my memory, a face of helplessness, of fear, and of love.

Screaming his name, which only came out as a muffled yell and a stream of bubbles, I floated back to the surface, where Omega was playing with Iggy.

I climbed out of the pool and faced Omega with a new fire.


	16. Chapter 16

Dripping wet, anchored to my senses by pure adrenalin, I flew over Omega. He turned, as if in slow motion, as I drove elbows, palms, fists, knees, feet and even wings into every pressure point I knew. Stepping under a punch, I spun, chopping his neck with a force that may have cracked a brick wall, and hooked my hand around his neck. Jumping, I pulled his face into my knee, flipped over him and drove my elbow behind me and into his spine. Keeping low, I stepped through his legs and levered him off his feet, and hit him in the back of the neck with the top of a wing.

Ever so slowly, I was inching him towards the pool.

I swung my leg up and slammed it down on his tailbone, which impeded his progress of getting to his feet. A sidestep and a snap kick to his tailbone again straightened him out, kneeling as if he were offering himself as sacrifice to the body of water a yard in front of him.

Just one more yard.

I flew away from him and skidded to a stop at the wall. Standing up and bracing myself against it, I screamed at him, 'GO TO HELL!!'

And activated my super speed.

My wings a blur either side of me, snapping against the wall and pushing themselves forward faster than I could follow in my hyper alert state, the air whipped around the room, pulling anything that wasn't tied down and a lot of things that were into two huge whirlwinds that formed on either side of the pool, one on each side of me. The water level fell as it was sucked into the raging winds, and carried up to the high roof. I felt the pressure behind me on either side drop dramatically, pulling me into the now cracked wall. I noticed little of this, focused completely on Omega.

He fell forward as the winds exploited his vulnerable position, and our eyes met as he drove his hand into the steel ground and swung around. His expression was blank, but his eyes shone with wonder and amazement as he slipped back and fell beyond the lip of the pool, dropping like a stone.

Tears filled my eyes. I couldn't stop my wings, but I didn't want to. Fang was gone, and the hatred for Omega was slowly replaced by endless longing and grief. Everything seemed hopeless, there was nothing left to do but tear apart the buckling walls and bring the roof crashing down.

Sinking further and further into the wall behind me, my wings eventually had less and less room to move, until I could do little but flutter them. The tornadoes died down, rain falling slowly. Exhausted, I sank to my knees and fell to the floor, darkness consuming all.

* * *

Gazzy was bracing himself in the corner. Nudge was doing the same thing on the other side of the wall to his right, and Iggy had only just become visible, hanging on for dear life to the rail on one side of the pool.

He didn't know what to think. Fang was gone, Angel was nowhere to be seen, Max had gone nuts at Omega, and now, a minute later, he was gone. What was he supposed to think or feel? Awe or fear at Max's one sided battle with someone who had just recently been too good for all of them put together? Grief for Fang, or the courage to fight on? He sank to the floor.

A splash made him look up again. There, in the pool, blonde hair floating around her, Angel surfaced. Gazzy jumped up and made a run for her, but stopped dead in his tracks when he noticed the larger shape that was about to surface next to her.

He couldn't even say anything, he was out of breath because he hadn't been able to breathe in the gale, water droplets had him stinging all over, and he was mentally exhausted. He did manage a whimper of warning, but Angel didn't notice. The whimper grew as he noticed Fang lying on the back of the shark-like creature that broke the surface, the water bulging as if not willing to let go of its prize.

Angel made some odd noises at the creature and pointed towards Gazzy, and it brought Fang over, Angel riding on its fin. Together, they lifted him out, Gazzy screaming for Iggy, who gingerly let go of the rail and ran across as quickly as possible.

'He's not breathing' Iggy declared unnecessarily. He ran a finger delicately along his neck. 'But he has a very weak pulse. Here, hold his head back' Iggy straightened Fang and tilted his head back, beginning CPR, pumping at his chest and barking at Gazzy to breathe air into Fang's lungs.

* * *

Angel stared at the whole process, tears streaming from her eyes. Fang hadn't exactly been the friendliest person in her life, but memories of way back were springing into her head, of Fang catching her up in the middle of the night and raiding the fridge with her, how he showed her how to walk silently and catching her when she stumbled and fell. Rare treasures she always kept with her, always remembered that she could count on Fang to comfort her when Max got a bit niggly and could laugh with him about it.

She couldn't watch this. Her heart felt like it had beat its way up into her throat and she was running out of tears to cry. Sobbing, she turned and spotted Max, sprawled on the ground, unmoving.

'MAX!' she screamed and bolted over to her. 'Nononononononono..' she mumbled as she rolled her over and checked her breathing and heartbeat. Both normal.

She frantically entered Max's mind and searched for something, anything, but hit a mental block.

_That's unusual_, she thought, and calmed herself to try again. Crossing her legs and breathing calmly, she slipped into Max's mind.

_There_. Images floating around, clouded and grey, all of Fang. Fang smiling, Fang eating, Fang watching the sun set with a bored face, Fang Fang Fang. Fang kissing her in the cave, Fang kissing her in the corridor, slowly running his fingers down her back. Her mind lingered on these pictures, as if stroking them, purring at their touch. Then she withdrew further into her mind, taking the images with her.

Angel probed deeper, further than she'd ever gone before, searching for Max's thoughts.

She gasped and fell back as she found it, severing the connection abruptly as sheer, pure grief flooded across the mental connection and into Angel. It only lasted for a second, but the experience had her curled up in a tight ball next to her lifeless motherly figure.

She knew why Max was unconscious. And she knew what was going to happen.


	17. Chapter 17

_Fang_.

The name echoed in what I guessed was my mind. Scenes flashed around me, voices from conversations long forgotten resurfacing for the occasion and spitting fragments at me.

I had no physical form, I didn't exist. There was no reason to exist. Why should I? I had failed to save Fang, then in my anger probably killed off the rest of the Flock. Maybe I was dead. I didn't really care. Fang was gone.

_Fang…I'm so sorry…Come back…Please…_

Something blundered into my thoughts, something foreign. I didn't care what it was, probably my happier, chirpier self, but I didn't want to be with it. It vanished with that decision.

The feelings stayed. I hated crying, but if I was awake, that's exactly what I'd be doing, shamelessly. The grief, the enormous ocean of sadness and tears sloshed back and forth, tossing me around. It was a horrible feeling, but I didn't want it to leave. I wanted to dissolve into it, become one with it, become sadness itself. I wanted this.

I drew myself a 'physical' form, a picture of sorrow, and rose above the ocean. Lifting my arms, I closed it around me, a cocoon of despair, where I could be alone with my blissfully heart-wrenching memories. I relived Fang's gentle kiss in the cave, felt him kiss me again in the corridor. I hugged myself as if I were hugging him.

_Max_.

_Get lost_ I thought back at the Voice who was so rudely interrupting and focused my grief around and through the presence I could now feel. I felt something explode on the other end. Whatever satisfaction I would normally have got from that was lost. Not that I cared.

I felt something else while I was focusing on the source of the Voice. How many Voices were there in my head?

Thinking about how I'd normally make a sarcastic comment about that, I let my cocoon drop into the sea, where I huddled, sobbing, tightening the walls around me. Not dissuaded, the presence poked around as if searching for me.

Fine.

I opened myself up to it, showed it my beautiful ocean. It recoiled and vanished quickly, and I hung my head. What was I doing? I was here, in my mind, having a battle with god knows what. I just wanted it to end, all of it, gone, disappeared. I sat on my sea and opened two paths, one on either side of me. One lead back to my body, where I could weakly feel the cold ground against my skin. The other lead to nothingness. An empty void. The end of everything.

I sprawled out and took comfort in the glorious choice.

* * *

'FAAANG!' Angel screamed as she scrambled up and ran over, once she felt she had recovered. Gazzy and Iggy looked up, and Nudge ran over to Max and rolled her over, checking for wounds.

'We're doing our best, but there's too much water in his lungs,' Iggy said, still pumping Fang's chest. 'Beathe!' Gazzy blew more air into his lungs.

'Max is okay, but she's not okay, she thinks Fang's dead, and she's really sad about it, so sad, she thinks she failed, we've gotta save her!' Angel blurted out all in one breath.

'…What?' Gazzy and Iggy asked at the same time.

Angel screamed and shoved Gazzy out of the way and slapped Fang's cheek as hard as she could.

Fang coughed loudly and rejected the water from his lungs, hacking uncontrollably. There was a nice little red hand on his face, too.

Everyone backed off him as he panted and rose shakily to his feet. 'So…' he said, calmly looking around. '…What did I miss?'

'You missed Max, that's what.' Gazzy replied wryly and pointed in her direction.

Angel wasted no time trying to work with her words again, instead shoving them straight into Fang's head. She put as much detail in as quickly as possible, then pushed him at Max.

In total surprise at Angel's intrusion, and god knows what about the actual message, he lost his balance and fell over as Angel pushed him, but scrambled up and staggered over to her.

* * *

I sighed, bringing up my ocean to form four giant wings, like a butterfly, and literally faced death. I blocked out all feeling to my body and stared into the blackness.

I didn't care anymore. So what if the Flock were alive, they would hate me for failing to save Fang, hate me for nearly killing off the rest of them. I was a traitor. How could I face them?

_Easy. I don't, _I thought, and stepped through the threshold.

* * *

'Oh no you don't,' Fang muttered as he reached Max, and without hesitation, sat on her chest and kissed her, biting into her lip, ignoring the warm blood that trickled out.

* * *

I gasped, my wings of anguish evaporating as I was wrenched from Death's grip and thrown into my body. My body, which was full of nerves that suddenly decided they were going to tell me my muscles were out for the count, my wings were heavily bruised, my back was out, my arm was dislocated, and Fang was biting into my lip.

Wait a minute.

I threw myself up at him, kissing him back passionately, muscles working for one good spasm so that for a brief moment before I fainted again, my arms were around his neck and I was happy again.

* * *

Fang blinked as Max so obviously came back to consciousness and so obviously left it again.

'Well…Err, this is awkward…' he said as Nudge and Gazzy stared at him, mouths agape. Angel was fondling with Max's hair and feathers, and Iggy was just a little confused, but looked suspiciously like he knew what had happened. 'So…What exactly did happen here?'

Silence.


End file.
